Great commentary was made from all over the room and it was a highlight of my time there.  I took a bunch away from interaction outside of the social circles and how you may treat communication and layers of friends you make just from the online sites.

Listen close as you get excellent insight into the difference between an in person friend you move to online and an online friend you treat as in person.

You can watch the entire episode on Mevio as well. (it was too big to make an official downloaded podcast)

P.S. Turn this one all the way up to get the best quality.

While at SXSW you are inundated with fancy QR codes, people handing out flyers and all say they are the hot new app.  I am not one to not try each and every application at least once.  I like to see what they do exactly the same, different and if they will have sticking power.  I dedicate a page on Android and iOS, then a folder on BlackBerry.  What I have is a crap load of applications.

So this year I want every to participate in the Great Uninstall, with a request.  I want you to comment here all of the applications you refused to load from SXSW and what you have uninstalled.

We will make this an annual event.  A very light pseudo survey of what apps make it out of the launch grind.  I will start reviewing applications and why I kept or removed them.  I write or screencam honestly each time.  I find features I like, ones I am confused by and ones that just do not make sense.  Place some of those comments as well.

If you decide to write your own posting, just make a comment with the link back, no issue.  I am trying to find some logic into the sheer number of applications that people attempt to run and then watch as you settle back into just a few.

I am not slighting any one platform here.  I am going across each and every one with removal in my eyes.  I am weighing how useful they were onsite, here outside of SXSW and long term possibilities.  If they make the round one cut, I will perform one more in a few weeks based on if I use it again or not (after this first run) and then make final selections.

In the end I hope to remove even some older ones I never use, add some new and streamline my productivity even more with the final set.

TheSocialGeeks Episode 33 was recorded live in the Austin Convention Center

Yes you shoot a stuffed bird with a huge slingshot at stuffed pigs and cubes.

You can also watch this in HD and all Spiked Studio shows on YouTube

After crunching the numbers of all the new locations and the delta change between the main venues, we basically broke ~2500 total check ins.  I did not include the restaurants like ESPN and the Big River Grill due to so many other tourists.  Instead I focused on all the brand new venues that were created and the ones I didn’t map and you took upon yourself to do.

Many of you checked into the main venue of Lotusphere 2011, by far leading the pack.  The bars, rooms, dining hall and more were all over the map.  As expected, the smaller meeting rooms got less.  We could have easily had some of the upper swarm badges, but we needed everyone to start checking in.  Word of mouth with the college students alone would have sealed the deal.

So thanks to everyone.  I learned some important lessons along the way once again and keep streamlining the process, ability and locations.  Send along any and all comments, tips or ideas so I can plan early.

So the question remains and I was constantly asked, why Foursquare?  Let me summarize the choice to use them for this event.  They offered a multitude of client support across devices.  I had a team making other products that wanted to integrate.  I was granted some stronger levels of power by Foursquare to edit, merge, create, delete and more.  It made making them all so simple.  I knew pictures were coming.  Granularity was easier.  I believed in checking into a room rather than a session itself.  You could always shout the session name and title.  Integration with numerous other applications, like Foodspotting, was there.

The list goes on.  I just wanted to share a huge thanks and let everyone know what a success it was.  Stay connected if you want.  It is purely optional and it will be back for the fourth year at Lotusphere 2012.

We are constantly adding new RSS feeds, streams and sources for our own consumption. Soon we file virtual bankruptcy and start over, leaving behind the sources we trusted. What we do not learn is the value that drew those sources to us in the first place. Learn how to use smarter filtering, tools and resources to streamline, remove duplication and find the most important information.

There will be a slew of questions I answer along the way:

1. What are the top tools you use for filtering content?
2. Are you basing your flow on keywords, broad topics or searches?
3. How did you build your trusted referral group?
4. Is a micro-community a source for filtering information?
5. Can you oversubscribe to a particular topic?

I hope you would take a moment to vote for the SXSW session if you like the idea, even if you are not attending in March 2011.  I will be posting the slides and content after the event.

1. Virtualization – one of the biggest cost savers a school can do.  Only a handful had heard of it, one a couple had implemented or thought of it.  The lower TCO was a major focus on hardware cost savings, warranty, energy consumption and disaster recovery.  He gave examples of 20 servers virtualized into 3 saving $24k of maintenance alone.  One new desktop can provide 4 virtual ones for students.  Server install time cut down over 75%.
2. Cloud Computing – an extension of your environment, some free.  All are easier to budget with less capital needed.  The benefit is on-demand, available anywhere with less internal sophistication.  Cost savings in his district for year one was $158,760.  Almost ~500m over 6 years.  This doesn’t take into account energy and backup savings.
3. Collaboration and Communication – the social media aspect.  There was an alternate social media session given before this one that went in depth.  Using the networking promotes 21st Century skills.  Reduces travel costs and expands reach.
4. Green Computing – more of a strategy than a technology.  Reduces obsolete devices and allows more technology for re-purpose.  Paper savings and more by using cloud , virtualization and collaboration.  Printing is a key place to start.  Store more electronically.  Set computers to power off at night.  Deploy LCD over CRT monitors.
5. Personally Owned Devices – only two hands raised when asked if their district would allow people to bring their own in.  Doing this could reduce E-rate funding, while needing less technology refreshment dollars needed.  It opens anywhere anytime learning and more students hands-on with technology.
6. eBooks – (this is my favorite)  This is huge in cost savings for schools.  This is more about getting students involved in reading the material.  Students reduce the backpack and the text is now searchable and linkable.  This fits new learning styles of kids.  But ow do you charge, manage and maintain the devices.  What is the lifespan?  Longer than the book?
7. Mobile Computing (iPads, smartphones) – New handheld “clickers” allow instant feedback from students.  Some have Internet access and is more cost effective than laptops.  There is security concerns and policy needs.  More network coverage may be needed.  The network becomes the key here.  If the network is down the learning stops.
8. DGBL: Digital  game based learning – basically edugaming in classes.  It is available online and promotes problem solving skills.  The student gets immediate feedback and multiple ways to learn with advanced complexity as you complete tasks.  Most of these are all licensed based, so possible increase in costs.
9. Augmented Reality – very new but an interactive way to keep students engaged.  It opens trial and error learning and situational experience, but it too new and raw. There would be bandwidth demand increases and classroom design changes.
10. Flexible Displays – paper thin displays.  Portable.  On demand visibility.  Outdoor learning.

The time showed the first 4 coming in this school year with the rest split in pairs across the next 5 years.  Basically all of these can be in place now, funds are the main issue.  You then enter implementation costs and time and training to the teachers.  The students would likely absorb it almost instantly.

• Identify top 3 community characteristics
• Express characteristics through four elements
• Identify elements’ activity flow
• Structure to promote characteristics and activity flow
• See the structure with interaction and content

Activity flow can be split between the type of person visiting the site.  From Savvy to Newbie, you have alternate flows that give everyone an excellent experience with the same end result.  Creating your profile on a site is a great example.  Savvy open straight to edit.  Newbie gets a walkthrough with the reasons for each step.

Cultivation of the user community involves seeding and much personal care for it to flourish and survive.  If you can not validate the content versus the reader engagement, you cannot find the common threads that bring it together.

I am revisiting each of my sites the past coutple weeks since Social Fresh and evaluating where I need to make changes to spur more growth.  Design changes have begun.  Feature addition and removals and a structured content posting routine.

I plan on revisiting this topic with an update in how it helped.

Let’s Talk: The Art of   Conversations and Marketing Through Them

The end person does not know nor trust you, but might respond back after they check you out or you give valuable information.  If someone stops you in the street after hearing you talk about a topic and hands you a flyer, do you trust them?  Do you check it out?  How is that different than doing the same in social media?  Trust needs to be established for growth to occur.

Instant trust is normally done via introduction from someone else you trust or a knowing through a community, group. friend or family.  Trust is rarely given just because you see their website or phone number on tv. Learn to illustrate your expertise and not just your products and catalog.  Learn to overshare others content over your content.  It doubles credibility.

Learn that helping others is not always about just helping yourself.  It is about the building of trust that you care about their needs and are willing to truly read their question and find the answer.

Many of these enterprises never invested the time or staff to search the web and respond to postings that are static and will be there forever, as compared to these short time postings found in Twitter.

What I am seeing is that customers may now complain loudly in Twitter to their few hundred followers, get a tweet reply per chance from the vendor, and be directed to an email address or direct tweet conversation.

• What happened to customers going to the website and clicking a link for live chat?
• What happened to quick customer service on the phone lines?
• Being able to talk to a live person in a short time by dialing the phone?
• Is the live social media stream more important than the bigger customer base?

I disagree with all of that.  Social media is an additional solution to the customer service and web support.  I know reaching out to where the user may be is important.  Facebook is a large base, with the fan page growth and sharing.  Twitter has sharing, but relies on link tracking more than anything.  But who clicked the link?  Who was the primary sharing source?  Were the amount of followers they have the real reason your message got out?

Staff from all the panel members is dedicated to monitoring, answering, responding, watching and reporting.  AT&T mentioned they found about 11k actionable tweets from the ~100k (forgot exact number) out there.  None addressed why these people were not doing this same function on their website or phone lines.  Is there no community they have built for their customers to have accounts linked so easily solve problems, route issues and communicate quickly?

I don’t think the results they are finding just in a few social media sites, with dedicating teams or people, is the proper focus they made it sound.  I heard how they funnel things to R&D, customer support and even promotions.  Does this drive traffic page to their website? Do they capture data on who these Twitter users are in relation to their system?  Can they convert a username on Facebook or Twitter to an account to fix or up sell services?

Stop thinking of these social media services as a solution and more of an aggregated draw of traffic to your true core services and a new way to get them engaged.